Black abolitionists played a leading role in the struggle against slavery and discrimination. They initiated opposition to colonization. They staged protests against segregated seating in churches and on public transportation. They circulated petitions, organized boycotts, and brought court suits in an effort to make segregated schools illegal. They provided the core subscribers for antislavery periodicals like The Liberator.

Fugitive slaves helped arouse Northern sympathy for the slaves' plight. Their first-hand tales of whippings and separations from spouses and children erased the notion that slaves were content under slavery.